The Fake and the Fake

A very, very long time ago.

Behind a peaceful, quiet village, there was a small cave in the hill at the back.

It looked like an ordinary cave, but it had one peculiar trait: cool in the summer, warm in the winter.

The villagers came and went from it as though it were a resort. On hot days and cold ones alike, the cave was always bustling with people seeking shelter from the weather.

But as more and more people crowded in, the cave grew cramped, and each time it did, the villagers pushed deeper and deeper inside.

The cave was deeper than anyone had imagined.

After exploring it for quite a long while, the village elders forbade anyone from going into its depths, fearing something might happen.

Then one day, a child who had gone to the cave for a little rest, just like everyone else, said something strange.

'Hee hee. I want some sweet cake.'

The child's parents felt an odd, unnameable wrongness.

Their child had celebrated a birthday two months ago — and this was not a child who asked for cake outside of a birthday.

But the parents bought the cake anyway.

The child ate it with delight, then looked up at them with a blank, vacant stare.

'Heeheehee... thank you. It's tasty, though?'

The child fell asleep.

And the next day, another child's parents vanished.

According to those nearby, the child and the parents had quarreled over a favor.

After that, the incidents kept coming.

Some lived. Some disappeared. Again and again.

Sensing how serious things had become, the village chief sealed the cave and forbade the townsfolk from entering.

And then.

'...Cake. I want to eat it.'

What happened next, you ask?

What happened next, you ask?

I opened my eyes.

A crisp blue sky and a small grove of green leaves. Before me stood the entrance of a sizable cave.

From the cutscene and the tip, I pieced together a single word.

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"A doppelgänger?"

Doppelgänger. One of the altered races born of the demons' experiments, distinguished by its ability to mimic a target's appearance, personality, and abilities in their entirety.

It carries a measure of demon blood, but by the nature of its kind it is nowhere near as powerful as a true demon.

Copying a weak target makes its power meaningless, and even when it copies a strong one, it cannot imitate everything. If you wanted to be precise, it sits closer to a 'demon-kin' species.

I had left the knight behind. She had only come along to guide the way, and it's far easier for me to clear a dungeon alone.

Above all — if this thing resembled the doppelgängers I knew...

'It might be a little dangerous.'

Heeheehee...

Hahahahaha~

I made my way into the cave.

Just as described, the cave held a cool, gentle warmth. Judging by the surroundings, this had been a mine in the past, but since the future mine had already been developed, the interior didn't feel all that vast.

Deeper in, a crowd of people laughed — hahaha — savoring drink and food, chattering away. From a distance, it evoked the image of a small festival.

Up close, though, the picture changed a little.

"Hmm... They seem fake, don't they?"

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Something about them felt like they were putting on an act of being warm, harmonious, happy people.

Getting closer only made it unmistakably alien. If anyone other than me were standing here, they would have felt sick to their stomach and fled on the spot. That was how deep the wrongness ran.

The neck of a middle-aged man merrily downing his drink spun clean around.

"Ah, a new guest, I see?"

"Yes. First time here."

"My, my, what a beauty you are. Make yourself at home and enjoy."

Hahaha~!

With that, the man's neck spun back around.

Isolated as a single scene, it was horror-movie material, plain and simple.

I gave a vague nod and settled into an empty seat. The people kept drinking and ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠eating, sparing me no interest whatsoever.

Hm. My voice dies out.

"It doesn't seem to be an illusion — the main body is probably somewhere in here."

"They've warded everything except my own voice, so it's fine. More importantly, I need to find the main body..."

Everyone in this place was either a fragment of the Copycat or one of many Copycats — that much was certain.

Setting aside the uncanniness that anyone with eyes could catch, the flow of mana through this space was twisted to an extreme degree. And the most violently twisted point of all would be where the main body resided.

'It probably believes itself to be perfect.'

I rose from my seat. Still, no one paid me any mind.

I observed them, one by one. A middle-aged man drinking with grand abandon. A young man belting out a song with delight. A middle-aged woman wolfing down meat. An old man lying at ease. A woman chattering loudly. And...

"A child."

"There are no children here."

In the cutscene, the Copycat had most certainly mimicked a child — more than once, no less, all over a craving for cake.

And yet now, there wasn't a single child in sight. Not even a boy or girl in the flush of growing years.

I wove between the tables to search more carefully.

Hahahahaha~ Hohohohoho~

Drink~ Drink~

They laughed in a way so uncanny I half wondered whether they were doing it deliberately. No matter how many times I passed among them, not one of them gave me so much as a glance.

Convinced there truly were none, I combed through the very last table with care. Two women laughed a hollow hoho beside a mountain of liquor, their postures subtly wrong. And in the corner of the table sat a small basket.

'...A basket?'

The basket was trembling.

When I gingerly lifted its cover —

I froze.

"......"

"......"

"......"

Dozens of eyes, all fixed on me. As though the festival they'd been enjoying a heartbeat ago had been a lie, every last person was staring at me and me alone.

Inside the basket was a little girl, trembling like a leaf.

She wore the same clothes and bore the same face as the villagers — but the difference was that this child was not a Copycat.

I had no idea how she'd gotten in, but she had most likely sensed the danger long ago and hidden herself away among these 'fakes.'

Click.

The middle-aged man who had spoken to me earlier rose from his seat.

"Oh? What seems to be the matter?"

"I have something to say, that's all."

If they were going to enjoy a festival, they ought to keep enjoying it. Why stop all at once and stare at me and me alone?

Of course, I already knew the answer — so I kept it to myself.

"Waaah!"

"I'll hold onto her for now."

I scooped up the child — likely to become my evidence for flushing out the main body...

At my curt words, the middle-aged man's — no, the Copycat's — expression crumpled.

"Why?! Why?! Whyyyyyyy!!! Would you do that!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

The Copycat huffed and fumed, brimming with fury.

And yet, for all that, it showed no intent to harm me or the child.

That wouldn't do.

I summoned my spear and asked.

"Where is the real one? I know it's absurd to ask a 'fake' about the real one, but..."

"Fa...ke?"

"Yes. Not the fake — the real one."

Fake. A word that utterly negates the Copycat's fundamental existence, just as it does for a doppelgänger.

To a Copycat, 'fake' is a word that does not exist. The Copycat is the real one; the target it mimics is the fake.

I had denied that, straight to its face.

Grind.

The sound of gnashing teeth drifted from somewhere. At the same instant, the villagers' eyes rolled back white.

"Di, die!"

"Hohohoho! How dare you!"

"Die, you fake!!!!"

"You arro...gant witch!!!!"

Dozens of villagers had drawn weapons at some point and came surging at me. Attacks far too refined for mere townsfolk.

No ordinary Copycat, this. It was not a swarm of its kind, but a single entity. A being capable of forging some of its 'copies' into something stronger than the originals would never, ever travel alongside its own kin.

"Careful, now!"

Heeheeheehee! Die, die!

Countless weapons came flying, all of them hungry to tear me to shreds —

And my body was pierced through.